MBM3

Unfortunately it is going to take a lot to compete with the new DL if/when the merger is approved. Not only will they have a huge domestic network - and thus a great international feed - but the KL/AF relationship on the otherside of the Atlantic certainly adds a huge chunk of business opportunities within Europe, Africa and Asia.

Now whether it will be profitable for the new Delta remains to be seen.

RTWFF

Con-U, surely?

RodneyBD

These are excellent points. I think a lot of people would agree with you.

However, all these points are irrelevant.

This would be a merger, which you may recall is a financial transaction. There will be winners, and there will be losers. There are huge egos involved, reputations at stake, careers on the line, board seats in play, legacies to be burnished... not too mention huge sums of money backed by highly opinionated people (known as investors and creditors). There is 0% chance the name will be chosen based on "brand awareness", "brand satisfaction", "brand value", "brand penetration" or any other brand measurement.

There is a circle of about - 200? 300? 500? - people ready to go to battle in merger talks, and the ultimate name will be fiercely contested. Look at the stats, which happen to be FACTS- UA is bigger in every way imaginable and you can bet Tilton and team will be acting like it. They are the Big Dog in this dance, and if CO is ultimately the name (definitely possible!) it's because someone on UA's side will have been paid off, or CO pulled off a coup d'etat.

One final thought - I also think we will see a silly press release/AP article at some point after the name is chosen. And I am pretty sure that article will quote company officials saying the name was chosen because of "the brand awareness/leverage/blah blah blah that "Uninental" evokes around the world".

You will definitely never see an article that says "After Tilton's depty told Kellner's depty to F#@& off cooler heads prevailed and a deal was struck allowing the losing side's pension plan to be stuffed with an additional $50 million".

spin88

on 752 UA has 24F mainline, and on the PS 752s they have 26c and 12F. Far more than CO offers (16 narrower BF seats on 752)

On the A320s you get no F (Ted) or 12F (mainline) so an upgrade is impossible or harder to get. This is less than on a CO 738 (14 to 18)

UA though also flies a lot of domestic 763s (34 F) and 772s (36F) on main routes. This does not count getting an international 763 (10F, 32C), 744 (14F/73C) or 772 (12F/49C). - note with the new lie flat C the number of seats will fall...

So I think that the overall number of F seats is probably greater on UA than CO as a percentage of seats. The main difference though is E+ I frequently don't request an upgrade, I'm happy in e+ and when I want an upgrade (transcon, SFO-ORD, SFO-DEN) I an as a 1K almost always get one. E.g. going SFO to JFK, i'm 10 for 10 this year, and that's in international C (not quite as good as BF, but close...).

UA also does not discount F seats as readily. Any joe can buy a F on CO for $100 more than a Y, on UA the price spread is nearly always much greater between F and the highest refundable fare (usually not a Y...) in the range of $250 each way on a 1000 mile itinerary, $500 or more each way transcon.

anyway the bottom line is that out of SFO, I get upgrades about 50% of the time on UA using my upgrade cirtificates, the rest in E+, which is much better than my about 40% F on CO with the rest in ugly 31" Y.... that said, I was doing a lot of SFO-EWR flights on SFO-IAH flights, all of which are busy FF routes and/or places where folks were buying the F seats. If I lived in smoose-ville and flying via IAH, my upgrade changes on CO would have been much better...

Renard

We can only hope the PC system would be the winner....my only comment might be it would be nice if there were additional capacity as they are way too packed at certain times of the day.

I may be wrong but I saw that as a hint that they're 'looking to leave' Skyteam.

I saw this as them saying 'we Are looking'....

Of course, this is just my uninformed opinion....and biased too

bocastephen

While your explanation makes sense, in practice, from what I've heard, the UA employees take deliberate measures to ensure their fellow employees get J or even F seats, even if it costs customers an upgrade, waitlisted or not. I heard stories of this long before I ever joined FT, and the UA board is ripe with complaints about this practice. How did J get renamed Employee Class, anway?

You state that a 1K should earn, by the end of the year, the following upgrade certificates:

40 x 500 mile certs
20 CR1 certs
6 SWU

My average flight length is about 3,500 miles - 1,000 miles FLL-IAH and another 2,500 miles IAH-SEA. So, I would need about 7 certs per roundtrip. Assuming an average of 10 round trips per year, I've used 70 certs, which is all my 500 mile certs plus a good chunk of my CR1s (assuming each CR1 is valid for one complete one-way stage regardless of length). Unless my upgrades clear at a higher rate than on CO, I don't see any advantage, but rather a disadvantage, as now I need to fly an extra 25K EQM every year (actually for me it would work out to around 18-20) to make 1K and get these benefits.

In addition, since I don't get all 40 certs up front, but earn them 10K at a time, I will need to either ride quite a few segments in coach, or buy certs until my mileage flow is enough to start accumulating them. I doubt a UA-centric merger would toss all CO Plats into the 1K pool and reward us with all our upgrade certs up front the first year. If MP is the surviving program, where do CO Plats end up? Golds? In the proposed DL/NW deal, miles and status will go from WP to SM at a 1:1 ratio so no one loses any core benefits.

If, as a 1K, my certificate upgrades cleared at around 99%, then I might consider it worthwhile to make an Asia mileage run every year to get the extra miles, but if my upgrade chances remain the same, or even dilute after the merger, I see no benefit - I'm better off going to DL/NW, or trying for ExPlat with AA if I want to fly the extra miles.

How easy is it for 1Ks to upgrade? Are there routes, like on CO, where upgrades are very hard to come by? How about Premier Execs?

I mentioned the differences outside of E+, but I've never heard good things about the UA coach seats, especially on the 747. Is this seat a new change? I've only heard complaints about the UA seat width and cushioning, and these complaints are coming from relatively shorter and lighter people.

Renard

The UA seat in coach has much better cushioning than any CO coach seat. Even the seats on their old 737s are better than the CO coach seat.

texd

Continited

channa

I would say that it's easier to upgrade as a Premier Exec on United than it is for a Platinum on Continental. Granted, that's my take living in SFO where CO upgrades are incredibly difficult.

The key difference is the aircraft size and configuration. UA has 757s with 24F, domestic and int'l 767s flying domestically; domestic and int'l 777s flying domestically, and the occasional 747 flying domestically. Yes, the UA 735s and A319s have worse F:Y ratios than CO's comparable planes, but a large chunk of the UA planes have a better ratio of F:Y. So yeah, if you want to upgrade IAD-SFO on a 319, you may have some competition. But try the 777, and you have a much better shot.

Then there's p.s. -- UA has taken the toughest upgrade markets in the country (NYC-LAX/SFO) and provided an incredibly good rate of F/C:Y, all with improved service.

Finally there's explus -- on many RJs there's a chance to upgrade. Sure it's not as good as mainline, but at least it's a bigger seat, free drinks, and a free snack box.

Combine all of the above with the certificate-based program, where people pick and choose their upgrades (you don't upgrade if you don't want the upgrade), and that lessens the pressure of who wants to get up front (it's not every Platinum, it's only the 1Ks who feel like upgrading). This allows the lower tiers to have a better shot at an upgrade.

Combine that with higher F (or C) fares, which sells fewer F seats, though at a higher margin, preserving inventory for last-minute sales, rebookings, and upgrades.

Add that to no universal policy for Y-Ups a la CO, and you don't have a flood of last-minute or full-fare travellers filling up F.

What do you get from all this? A much more favorable upgrade rate.

You take that, and combine that with the more reasonable fall-back position of E+, combined with the largest frequent flyer program in the world, relatively easy reward redemption, an empowered customer service culture that caters to Elites, and you've just created a fiercely loyal customer base.

I've said this before, but from a customer service standpoint, UA treats a Premier Executive better than CO treats a Platinum.


I'm not sure what the concern is about the Y seat on UA. The UA seats are Recaro branded, with far better padding than what CO has. In fairness, CO's new seat bottoms and padding on the 752 is a big improvement. But the rest of CO's seats are very hard and not comfortable. And that doesn't even mention the legroom issue.

Hartmann

Continental made a good choice

Does everyone think that DL will actually follow through with the "we're keeping the hubs" idea? I can't see Memphis lasting very long... CVG might incur the same wrath.

nd_eric_77

I guess I will soon no longer have CO PC access, but I do hope for you guys' sake that UA adopts CO's drinks policy, rather than making PCs into glorified airport bars (though with the benefit of ticketing agents who are actually helpful) like UA RCCs and AA ACs are.

tuolumne

This is a common misconception but is not the case. Read this,

http://www.flyerguide.com/wiki/index...BP)_Codes_(UA)

There is no way to override the system that would enable an agent to "bump" their passrider above a normal passenger. It's commonly called employee class for that very reason. First class travel is one of the last great benefits that United offers their employees and you can sure bet that any move to either limit this or get rid of the first cabin will meet with some harsh resistance. Nevermind the fact that much of UA's route strucute fully supports a F cabin (read HKG/LHR/NRT, etc.),

Outside of the dismal seats found on the 735s, United has very comfortable economy seats. The bottoms are cushioned very well and they all have adjustable headrests (that can be folded inwards). And then you have Economy Plus at your disposal.

texd

Y'all too, huh?

spin88

with experience on both (and also SFO based) I agree with the analysis, but perhaps not the 1k vs. 1p vs. Plat conclusion. Fying SFO-EWR, or SFO-IAH, my upgrade changes on UA are much better than they were when I was flying CO, even on a full Y. That said, if I flew a lot of secondary markets via IAH, I think I would do better as a PLT, you would run out of upgrades (and now want to waste the SWUs or CR1s) on UA and be in E+

However, a 1p only gets e500 cirtificates, so they are going to be only in F 20% maximum, rest in e+. If I did not buy y tickets ever, and flew out of ERW, UA would probably still be better, but if you were in secondary markets where more upgrades were possible (or via IAH) then CO would probably be a better choice at PLT than 1p on UA.

This said 1P on UA (realistically 15% in F with cirtificates, rest in e+) would beat Gold on CO any day...

[/QUOTE]

I'm not sure what the concern is about the Y seat on UA. The UA seats are Recaro branded, with far better padding than what CO has. In fairness, CO's new seat bottoms and padding on the 752 is a big improvement. But the rest of CO's seats are very hard and not comfortable. And that doesn't even mention the legroom issue.[/QUOTE]

Neather am I, the UA Y seats are much better than CO seats. Always have been. More padding, functional headrest, and even in e- better pitch. The only issue is some of them are worn out, sort of like some of the UA metal...

only thing CO has inflight over UA in Y is (1) food (marginal benifit...) and (2) much better video screens, UAs are all worn out.

Lurker1999

UA has decided though, in their infinite wisdom, that neither E- nor E+ would get in-seat power in their cabin refresh. That's a big minus and has kept me from considering United for a lot of my long-haul travel. But wait, I forgot everyone here will be flying in C all the time.